Electra

"Cash," Erin replied, picking up the fish and putting it back in the cardboard crate. She didn't bother trying to put Oliver back in there this time, instead picking him up and cuddling him as the vet made notations on Oliver's new chart. Despite his cruel treatment, Oliver purred and nuzzled her jaw affectionately. She followed Gregory out to the front where he kept the till, and carefully counted out her hard-earned babysitting money. It was all in cash, since trying to open a bank account would've been something of a logistical nightmare. "So I was wondering," she asked Gregory, "what kind of superpowers let you be a vet, anyway?"

Oliver gave the vet a skeptical look, then washed his left front paw. He seemed to have an intelligent look in his eye, for a feline, but that might have just been Gregory's imagination. He also kept his tail clamped tight to his body and his butt flat against the examination table in a show that might have been nothing, but might also have been passive resistance. Erin scratched the cat behind the ears. "It'll be okay," she assured the cat. "Mr. Summers says he's a very good vet. This won't take very long."

"Um, well, he understands English," Erin offered. "And I think maybe some Spanish, too. And he doesn't like it when you baby talk him. And sometimes when he feels upset, the people around him feel upset too, so you might want to watch that. But he never bites or scratches or anything like that," she hastened to assure the vet. "He's a nice cat." She reached into the crate and withdrew the source of the scent, what looked like a rather large and badly mangled whiting. "Look Oliver," she crooned encouragingly, "I've got your fish. Doesn't it smell nice? You can have it if you get on the table." The cat seemed to consider that for a moment, cocking his head, then leapt up onto the table. He gave the fish a possessive sort of lick, and the vet a suspicious look.

At that point, Oliver apparently decided he was tired of being in the crate, and that if he was going to be sent in for torture, he was at least going to have some dignity about it. Slipping right through the solid side of the cardboard crate, the scrawny orange kitty stepped disdainfully onto the battered linoleum and padded his way towards the examining room. The crate was still entirely intact and closed, with no possible way he could've gotten out. Erin looked at the vet and shrugged. "He sort of goes where he wants to go. You'll have to reason with him to get him to do what you want. Or bribe him." She hefted the fish-smelling crate and followed the cat towards the exam room.

"Well, he's a cat, but he's kind of weird," Erin replied unhelpfully. "He needs to get a checkup and vaccinations, and an updated rabies tag. You can do that here, right?" There was a scratching noise from inside the cardboard crate as Oliver indicated his displeasure at the delay. He wasn't going to stay in there much longer, even with the bribe he'd been presented. "It's probably easier to do it now, when there's nobody else around."

"Yeah, I have an appointment for my cat, Oliver?" Erin told him, shifting the crate to her other hand. She looked around, but the place seemed totally empty. She couldn't even see or hear a vet tech around. Weird, but this didn't exactly seem like a high rent district. "I, um, I heard that you're the best guy to deal with unusual animals," she said meaningfully. "I couldn't go to just any vet."

As he watched out the front window, a shiny blue pickup truck pulled up into the lot out front. It was in great shape and gleamed like new, which was a lot more than could be said for the young woman who climbed out of it. She was in extremely good shape, true, but wearing faded secondhand clothes and looking... well, tousled would be a kind way to put it. Maybe harassed was more like it. She pulled a cardboard animal crate out of the cab of the truck and said a few words to it, then shut the door and headed for the building. "Now you behave," Erin muttered to the crate as they headed for the building. "We have a deal, remember? Be good and get your shots, and you get the rest of the fish. If you mess this up, it's back to the discount kibble." A discontented meow came from the crate as she pushed open the door to the lobby and walked inside. She paused for a moment to take in the building, automatically scanning it for defensible positions, windows and exits, and any potential threats. As she did so, the overwhelming smell of fish began to permeate the air, centered on the crate. "Are you the vet?" she asked Gregory.

The bees were circling now, maybe having a strategy session of their own. "I don't think so," Erin said. "That was when we had to get their attention and get them away from the park. Now they're pissed at us, and I hope they think we're invulnerable to fire. They'll have to come down here if they want to get us, and I bet they will. We have the advantage on the ground, they're so big they'll have a hard time maneuvering this low. Give them one more good razzing and we'll see what they do."

The bees were circling now, maybe having a strategy session of their own. "I don't think so," Erin said. "That was when we had to get their attention and get them away from the park. Now they're pissed at us, and I hope they think we're invulnerable to fire. They'll have to come down here if they want to get us, and I bet they will. We have the advantage on the ground, they're so big they'll have a hard time maneuvering this low. Give them one more good razzing and we'll see what they do."

"Well, there's always grad school," Erin quipped, even as she set down in the middle of a tree-edged cornfield outside the city. There didn't seem to be a whole lot of damage they could do here, except maybe create a few acres of popcorn. Now that they were out of the city, Erin wasn't quite sure what to do with the massive bugs. They were intelligent, so killing them would be wrong, but letting giant bees rampage around and set fire to things also seemed bad. "Do you know if the Beekeeper's still in jail?" she asked Jack.

Erin continued running and leaping, Freedom City passing by at a phenomenal rate as the buildings became shorter and more spread out. "Giant flowers?" she asked incredulously, the words almost stolen by the wind. "We don't have any of those, do we? We're just going to have to beat them up. Get ready!" With those optimistic words, she launched into another giant leap, taking them beyond the confines of Freedom City.

Erin walked in and automatically scanned the building, inventorying the doors and windows, taking stock of the people for any potential threats. A few people were looking at them, but less than she might have expected. Maybe blue and gold spandex was a look in this neighborhood. With a good idea of the layout of the place, she stepped into line and picked up a paper menu to give it a look. She wasn't really comfortable talking about hero stuff in the middle of the lunch line, so instead she looked up at her tall, tall companion. "What's good here?"

"Perfect!" Wander exclaimed to Jack. "Keep it up!" Grabbing him around the waist once again, rather like a giant stuffed toy, she leapt into the air, bouncing from rooftop to rooftop and heading out of downtown. With the bees close on her heels, she went east, figuring she'd rather fight over the suburbs or rural land than risk falling into the ocean with a missed jump. "Keep them following us! Say bad things about their queen or something!"

During the ascent, Green and Liebinz had managed to get the radio working, so it was only a few more minutes before the Coast Guard ship they'd alerted was at their position to pick them up. The sub would have to be towed in, but for all Stesha cared, it could've fallen right back to the bottom of the sea and stayed there. The Coast Guard was very confused by the nonsensical account of their narrow escape, but for the moment, they seemed to be chalking it up to adrenaline and relief. Less than an hour after they'd surfaced, Stesha was happy curled up in a seat in the galley with a warm cup of cocoa and a blanket around her shoulders. Not that she needed it, but it was oddly reassuring. It was a lot easier, she'd discovered, being calm during a crisis than afterwards, when you realize how close you'd come to dying. It had been a trip she'd never forget, she'd give Quentin that much.

This time the ship did more than creak, it groaned as the weight of the sea attempted to rush inside the seemingly fragile shell of metal and cape. "Opening the air valves!" Green announced, his voice cracking on the last word. There was a rushing, hissing sound from outside the airlock, and suddenly, the whole ship was rolling lazily to its side! Everyone fell over, and by the time they regained their feet... "We're lifting, we're lifting, look!" Stesha cried, pointing to the viewport. Sure enough, the sideways view showed the murky bottom receding as the makeshift balloon wrapped the ship. Stesha used her vines to secure the balloon, making sure that it would stay attached as they began to slowly ascend in the water.

Liebinz started at him. "You're mad!" he sputtered. "To risk opening the airlock at this depth, for... for... a child's plaything, some sort of toy? The nitrogen narcosis has got one of us after all!" "No, no..." Green countered, sitting up with Stesha's help. "If the cloth is strong enough, if the balloon can get big enough... we could deploy it around the whole ship, and come up in the center of the balloon..." He was obviously woozy, but still enthusiastic. "We have no way to manipulate the cloth!" Liebinz protested again. "It will drift away! The whole plan is preposterous!" "I think it will work," Stesha said with a confident smile to Quentin. "Just explain exactly how you need it to be laid out, and I'm sure it'll work itself out."

"I'm doing what I can," Stesha replied quietly, looking up towards the windows as she took the first aid box. "They're growing very quickly, but they're still just plants. Not even trees. Nothing down here has what you might call a woody stem. If we can't lighten the sub, I'm not sure we're going to make it to the surface in time." She broke the single-use cold pack open and applied it to Green's head, giving him a reassuring smile. "There we go, that'll reduce some of the swelling, and we'll see if we can't find some nice ibuprofen in here to help it feel better." As she dug in the box, she looked back at Quentin. "Can't you and Liebinz work together on this? You've got to get the ballast pumps working before we lose power again!"

The ventilators began to hum once agan, converting seawater into breathable air. Stesha sighed relief right along with them. "Now that we're off the bottom, can you start draining the ballast tanks, slowly?" she asked Liebinz. "If we control the ascent, we should be safe." Somewhat belatedly, she went to take a look at Green, who was just starting to blink and open his eyes on the floor. "Are you all right?" she asked him with concern. "That was quite a bump." "Whoza?" Green asked blearily. "My ship... the vent! Did we get the readings?"

Stesha made a noise that sounded suspiciously like a whimper, looking around at the ship. "If it starts to go, I'm going to try and teleport us," she decided aloud. "I have no idea what that will do to the ship, or to us, but better to at least have a chance at surviving than getting crushed in this thing. If I only had my seeds, I could just get us all out of here and everything would be okay." A thread of despair was weaving its way under the calmness in her voice now, as she contemplated the very long ascent ahead of them.

"More or less," Erin said with a shrug. "We had to kick one guy off the team a couple weeks ago, but other than that it's been pretty good. When you live and work with the same people all the time, you sort of have to learn to trust them. So it's extra hard when somebody screws up really badly. We do a lot of solo and small group work too. Most things don't need all seven of us, or somebody's gone or not available or whatever. " She loitered at the mouth of the alley and waited for Fulcrum to take the lead, uncomfortable with walking into public in her uniform without something to draw attention away from her.

"That's good, I can feel it getting easier," Stesha muttered, closing her eyes to concentrate on her work. "Okay, here we go, cross your fingers..." The entire submarine shuddered and tilted once more, this time returning to an even keel and beginning to rise. It was a very slow process, but gradually they left the sea floor and began to drift upwards, buoyed by a cushion of plants. The air in the sub was getting very stuffy, but it was a little better right near the plant controller. "Can you make a light?" she asked him.

Stesha gave him a narrow eyed look, then pointed to the window. "Warm up the water, Quentin," she told him, unable to conceal a thread of exasperation in her voice. "Plants like the warm water, it helps them grow. If it helps them grow, it helps me grow them. If I can grow them easier, we'll get out of here faster. If we get out of here faster, we may avoid being squished into tiny smears of jelly, and I won't have to see whether I can still regrow a body under 100 atmospheres of pressure. You see?" Even as she spoke, the algae outside was in motion, wrapping delicate lacy tendrils around the body of the ship.

Stesha looked at him, then at the suit, her eyes wide. "We're three thousand feet deep, give or take, aren't we? Thirty-three feet per atmosphere of pressure... we've got to be looking at nearly 100 times surface pressure out there. Even if we risked opening an airlock and putting someone out there, we wouldn't be able to bring you back in, or your blood would instantly boil." She looked to the window again, concentrating harder. A few tendrils of algae approached the boat, waving in front of the window. "I can do it, I just need a boost..."

"That's not what I wanted to hear, Quentin," Stesha murmured, her face paling a little despite her confident words of earlier. "Liebinz is right about one thing, if the skin on this thing doesn't hold, we're going to be flatter than a beer can at a frat party within a minute. I think if I can just get a hold on some of the plants out there, I can get some over to the ship, but it's not going to be easy. They're not used to growing quickly, and I'm getting a lot of resistance." She flexed her fingers against the glass of the window. "Can you make the water any warmer out there? It might help a little."

Stesha's Diplomacy check, using an HP to reroll a bad first result: a 28.